“Good. I’ll just keep it all for myself then.”
“Excellent. Hey, here’s a question. If you’ve been secretly married to Pretty Boy Valentine all this time, that means that you’ve actually been cheating on his ass with Manbun Mike.”
Ella groaned. “Please stop calling him that.”
“Fine. Hipster Harry.”
“His name is Jagger.”
Gen barked out a laugh. “I love how you think that what I said was more insulting to him than what you just said.”
“I know you don’t like him, which is weird since you’ve never even met him, but he’s not that bad. Plus, we’ve been on, like, three dates. It’s nothing serious. He just delivers my clay, and sometimes we go out.”
“Oooo…he delivers your clay…”
Ella smacked her arm. “For sculpting, you perv.”
“Okay. So, his name is Jagger. He delivers clay to sculptors, and, yes, he has a manbun. I don’t think it’s a stretch to call the man a hipster. I’ve personally never met anyone who sounds more like they’d be on their way to a drum circle. Trust me, there are worse things I could say about him.”
“Please don’t.”
“Does Jag-off know he’s the other man?”
“Gen, stop.”
“Did you get a burner cell for all your illicit communication? Do you meet at sleazy motels that rent by the hour?”
“Oh my God, stop!” Ella knew that the impact of her words was probably mitigated somewhat by the fact that they were delivered through laughter, but she had to at least make an attempt.
Gen shrugged. “It’s fine. I was getting myself all hot and bothered, anyway. Not at the thought of Microbrew Mitchell, obviously. But, yeah. Describing all that delicious illicitness kinda got me going.”
“Your mind is a place I fear exploring too deeply.”
Gen grinned and lifted her beer, clinking the bottle against Ella’s in small makeshift toast. “Probably for the best.”
They drank in silence for a while after that, and even though Ella still had zero idea how she should handle the situation, she did find herself eternally grateful that, no matter how much of a mess it turned into, she would always have Gen’s unique brand of sarcastic but steel-strong support to get her through it.